i want to show you what john mccain said on fox. he said, there's a lot of ill will towards senator hagel because when he was a republican, he attacked president bush mercilessly and said he was the worst president since herbert hoover, said the surge was the worst blunder since the vietnam war. is this hagel fight about policy or is it about a political payback? >> this is all about politics. when you listen to that quote from john mccain and you watch the way he and his colleagues conducted himself, they look like an infomercial for anger management therapy. it was truly nothing more than a grudge match. we have almost 70,000 soldiers in combat in afghanistan representing us, fighting for our country and also protecting each other. we need to have a strong figure coordinating the pentagon. and the tactics that you see mccain and the republicans engaging in clearly undermine the next secretary of defense who they all acknowledge is going to be chuck hagel. the other issue, don, is politics in the context of political preservation.